What is llms.txt and Should Your Website Have One

What is llms.txt?

llms.txt is a proposed standard for a plain-text file placed at the root of a website (at yoursite.com/llms.txt) that tells large language models (LLMs) how to understand and use your website's content. It was proposed in 2024 by Answer.AI co-founder Jeremy Howard as a structured way for websites to communicate with AI systems that crawl and index content for retrieval.

Think of it as robots.txt for AI engines — a simple, machine-readable file that helps AI systems understand what your website is, what it does, and what content is most relevant for retrieval and citation.

What Does llms.txt Contain?

An llms.txt file typically includes: a one-paragraph description of the organization and its purpose, a list of key pages with brief descriptions of their content, guidance on which content is most relevant for different query types, and optionally a list of URLs the organization wants AI systems to prioritize for retrieval.

The format is Markdown-based, which makes it readable by both humans and AI systems. A basic llms.txt might look like:

# Kennext
> Kennext is an SEO + AEO audit platform that scans websites, generates platform-specific AI code fixes for every issue found, and tracks team progress from discovery to verified resolution.

## Key Pages
- [Home](https://kennext.ai): Platform overview and free scan signup
- [Pricing](https://kennext.ai/pricing): $149/mo single plan
- [How it works](https://kennext.ai/about): Full platform walkthrough
- [Free Scan](https://kennext.ai/free-scan): Free site audit with no credit card required

Does llms.txt Actually Improve AI Visibility?

The honest answer is: it's too early to say definitively. Google, OpenAI, Perplexity, and Anthropic have not publicly confirmed that they actively use llms.txt in their retrieval systems. The standard is still a proposal, not an adopted specification.

However, several factors suggest it's worth implementing: it costs almost nothing to add (it's a plain text file), it forces you to articulate your brand and content clearly (useful regardless of AI systems), and early movers in emerging standards often benefit as adoption grows. Perplexity has indicated interest in structured formats that help their retrieval systems understand site content.

Should Your Website Have llms.txt?

Yes — with appropriate expectations. Creating an llms.txt file is a low-effort, no-downside action. The risk of implementing it incorrectly is minimal, and the potential upside of helping AI systems understand your content more accurately is real.

However, llms.txt should be treated as one component of a broader AEO strategy — not a silver bullet. The factors that most reliably improve AI citation rates are structured data (FAQ schema, Organization schema, Product schema), content that directly answers buyer questions, and third-party citations from authoritative sources. llms.txt supplements these but doesn't replace them.

How to Create an llms.txt File

Create a plain text file named llms.txt. Place it at your website root (yoursite.com/llms.txt). Open it in a text editor and write a brief Markdown-formatted description of your organization (one paragraph), followed by a list of your most important pages with one-line descriptions. Upload the file to your web server. Verify it's accessible by visiting yoursite.com/llms.txt in a browser.

Kennext's AEO audit checks for the presence and quality of your llms.txt file as part of its 40+ AEO signals, and will flag it as a missing item if it's not found — with a template for creating one specific to your platform.